Breakdown

There are two ways to look at an early stretch that’s laden with home games: It offers first-year coach Matt LaFleur the chance to get off to a good start, or, given that many new coaches start out slowly, it’s going to be tough to recover and finish strong with all those road games at the end. Either way, it’s the first time since the strike year of 1987 that the Packers have as many as five home games among their first seven. That year, it was actually six of their first eight in the state of Wisconsin followed by a brutal stretch of five of the final seven on the road (they won just two of those final seven). Despite two consecutive non-playoff seasons, the league still considers the Packers a draw with five prime-time games, including two Thursday night games (at the Bears and home against the Eagles), two Monday Night Football appearances (home against the Lions and at the Vikings) and a Sunday night game (at the Chiefs).

Not-so-frozen tundra

Golf courses will be still be open when the Packers play their third-to-last home game against the Panthers on Nov. 10. After that, they will play just twice more at Lambeau Field, meaning the cold-weather advantage they typically have is all but nullified. And one of those December home games is against another cold-weather team, the Bears. It’s a similar setup to the 2017 season, when they played just three home games after Nov. 19. And it’s far different from 2011, when they played half of their home games from Nov. 20 on. It’s also the first time since 2004 that the Packers have closed the season with consecutive road games.